52 Ways to Color This
by Perfections-Cat
Summary: My take on the 52 flavours theme, starring Sasuke and Naruto others may make an appearance . SasuNaru can be read parts of this, so read at your own risk. A set of oneshots/drabbles with themes.
1. 48 Lost in order to become precious

Yeah, so I know I have stories all over the place that need to be finished. And they will now that summer is upon me. But this was something I started during the semester, but never posted, and since I'm in this mode of writing, I'm going with it. Annnnywho, these are all inspired by the 52 flavours community over at LiveJournal -since these tend to border on SasuNaru I've never posted them there (**Warning** for those of you who plan to read these all the way through.) Enjoy!

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"How could you just go and do something so stupid?" he screamed out, tanned cheeks flushing an angry red. It was impossible. To think that **he** would do something so…it wasn't possible. Sasuke had always been one of the top shinobi Naruto had ever known. For him to act in such a manner… 

The blond couldn't seem to reconcile it. It just made no sense. No sense at all. Deep blue eyes narrowed at the figure before him. Almost funny now - well at least in some dark corner of his mind that could appreciate it - when he contemplated it. Never had Naruto actually called the Uchiha heir stupid and truly meant it. Sure, it was easy to counter Sasuke's insults with something as childish as crying out _Idiot_. But tonight he meant it. Never had he been so infuriated by something the dark-haired prodigy had done.

"You couldn't have waited! How could you?" Again that deep-throated roar. Furious as only the human voice can be when disbelief collides with rising pain.

It was hurting him. Unlike any sort of hurt he had ever experienced in his life. Beyond the depths of social displacement – even with each and every cold stare he had experienced, the callous words whispered just loudly enough to reach his ears, where he knew but didn't quite _know_ why it was the village hated him so.

Beyond that day at the Valley of the End, where Sasuke had betrayed him, left him for dead though Naruto thoroughly refused to believe that the Uchiha heir had wanted him to die. No, he definitely could have killed him. But he hadn't…and so there had been something more to them that not even that cruel breaking-off could sever completely.

Beyond even the near-miss finds and all the pain that had been thrown into finding him, that hint of a presence. Never was there when he finally arrived. Nothing more than some ghost of a memory that plagued him with every night spent asleep. Funny, he hadn't slept for two days prior to this moment. Mind full of hateful dreams and vague imagery of what-should-have-been-but-clearly-wasn't. That was something Naruto did truly hate: constantly wishing that he could just go back to that time. Before that rift had developed between them, driving Sasuke further away with every step he took towards him.

"Stupid, stupid Sasuke!" he cried, this time the tears welling up hot along his lower lid. His hands shook, balled into tight fists that thumped dully against his upper thighs with every shudder that worked over his body. "How could you….?"


	2. 39 The need to hold still

I have this awful need to hold still with you.

The last time I remember such a thing. . . .Well, I suppose we never did actually. Constantly caught up in this game of tag. Only I was never 'it'; you were always chasing after me.

Wasn't much of a game either, was it? I don't think they are supposed to end like this.

Would it help now if I told you this is all that I had wanted? For us. What a grand lie it would be to say this was all I had ever wanted from life, but afterwards. . .after I completed what I had set myself to, this was all that I wanted.

Sometimes I doubt we ever could. Hold still, I mean. You are way too loud, too confident, too energetic for your own good. Then again, what good is all that stamina if you don't put it to use? Heh. . .I suppose you were good at something after all.

I don't think my name lends itself easily to a quiet life either. So, perhaps I am also to blame for the way this all worked out. Couldn't wait. Couldn't sit still. But it never stopped me from wishing I could.

You know, I've bled before. Many times. But, I don't think I ever recalled the warmth of it, how easily it flows down skin only to shatter on the ground.

I suppose this makes me 'it'.


	3. 1 Five Shades of White

He could remember all too clearly the white of her dress. And how he had imagined what lay beneath it and how the thought had nearly made him sick. Not something he wanted, but something he hated. An image fit to be destroyed in the flames he commanded so well. But hands remained still, tight fists at his side as the vows were read.

He's never forgotten the look in those blue eyes when he announced the arrival of his first son. Teeth flashed white, an impossibly wide smile on his lips. The kind that manages to infect all those around them with a thrill of joy. Only he remained unmoved by those words, the tightest of smiles offered. But his envy-inducing looks – the whiteness of his skin, the dark eyes that burned with hellfire passion as most wrote it off and far better than the coolly indifferent ice storm that was there at most events – were more than enough to fool the world.

On the night he first told him, the moonlight had spilled over his left arm, threading the white bandages at his wrist with a fine silver. Out of place, he had first thought, like a glass that had been knocked over accidentally, the contents staining what was once pristine. Later, he would come to understand.

The last time he saw him the moon had also been out. That night, the clouds had had a horrid habit of cutting through the light, tossing them into darkness. It never failed to amuse him how unconcerned the world truly was with the doings of man. But what got him more in that single moment was how pure white seemed when the red crept over its borders.


	4. 18 The smell of hospitals in winter

They let him go back there because he was the one. He had always been the one, and everyone knew that. Only that fact had hit him a little late. Or rather, he hadn't really wanted to acknowledge it until it suited him.

And nothing had suited him. That was until he had watched his brother fall lifeless to the dirt in some unknown clearing of some unknown forest in what had been an all too familiar country. But it wasn't the proverbial light flicking on inside of him.

It was a slow, but solid awakening. A reawakening really. Nudging years old memories to the surface of his mind, the emotional attachments that came with them jumpstarting all senses with potent electrical pulses of feeling. It had started with a glance. Then a smile. Only to come flooding back with touch.

Yet, even then, there was an emptiness. And he couldn't help but wonder if all of it – this endless parade of corpses that was his. . .their lives – was to blame. If everything he had ever done had set him up for this. If there wasn't a part of him that liked it like this. Because it left him free of guilt and memory and everything that had ever plagued his sense of life.

Despite the nightly warmth of Naruto next to him, the gradual acceptance of Konoha, Sasuke had never once stopped questioning that. To live. But as he followed them, the sterile smell of _clean_ besieging his nose, that part of him fell silent. Waiting. Like an aged wolf that knows the end is near and turns its head, unafraid, in its direction.

He lost his grip, fingers useless without the warmth to guide them. Lost. Sasuke could only watch, listen to the cry that shot through the corridor. A new thing to violate his thoughts, his dreams.

And he understood it then. That you don't know life until you've seen it frothing out crimson bright from a body so desperately clinging to it.


	5. 12 Wake Unto Me

Daydreams were nothing new to him. They came and went, drifting into his thoughts like stray clouds over a spotlessly blue sky. Spilling shadows over his thoughts below. Distracting. Strangely calming.

But the day he came back, they had taken on another quality. As if the presence of Sasuke, willingly in his life now, had managed to infuse Naruto with his own being. A small slice of who he had become. A new, ideal forsaken connection.

He hadn't noticed it at first, had brushed aside the dreams as images crafted from his wants. Desires that he pushed away roughly with a good shake of his head and a frustrated ruffling of his blond hair. Then Sasuke had approached him, mentioned casually how perhaps they should think of getting a place together. After all, it meant someone would always be there (to _guard_ Sasuke had said with a smirk that dismissed the possibility of anyone there in Konoha being capable of such a task).

Really, though, it meant he could leave his memories where they had rested for all those years – in the broken down remains of his childhood home, in the dust-claimed apartment he had lived in until his departure. And Naruto understood, agreed with a surprised nod of his head (and later a wide grin that came with laughter).

Somehow, in that time, from trial missions that worked their way into full-fledged ANBU assignments, things began to change. Nothing unwanted, though it had been awkward at first. The way they ate meals together in a silence that was not bred from avoiding the questions but because there were none. The way they could both pass out after day upon sleepless day in the field, always with Sasuke beneath and Naruto's head settling on the nearest portion of the dark haired teen's body, and wake up completely startled by their proximity.

Funny that falling into the comfortable could be such a weird thing.

He enjoyed it though. Secretly loved the way Sasuke could be, even at his worst, because he was home. Was where he had always been wanted. Where he had been needed. And the Uchiha heir seemed to know this, even though that knowledge was begrudgingly accepted. Naruto only knew that to be true because Sasuke stayed.

Yet, the more Sasuke was accepted the less Naruto began to see of him. He would be called off to some meeting (even if he was a great ninja, he still needed to prepare, Tsunade constantly, and often loudly, _informed_ him) as Sasuke set off for another mission.

As trust grew, the dreams began to change. Where he could see Sasuke, vividly depicted in his mind as he sat huddled amongst the leaves of a tree, as he raced through the desert, as he waited and fought and slept and ate. All without him.

Just flashes of what could be. And he began to wonder. Sasuke was the best Konoha had (aside from himself, a fact he still shoved in Sasuke's face every time he saw the bastard after a period of absence), but the assignments were always the worst. Never a slack in the degree of danger the Uchiha heir tossed himself into. The type of thing that could make even him question.

But always the dreams.

So he didn't worry, let his mind carry him away from the discussions on foreign policies and village details. Drifted through the scenes as they came to him, tuning into the voices around him only when the visions faded like smoke curling up into the sky never to be seen again. Dispersed and carried away on winds he never felt.

Until one day, Sasuke looked at him. Smiled slightly in the way he only ever seemed to do for him alone, and just stood there. Hands remained by his sides, loose and relaxed. Weaponless. As though waiting. Not for the mission to begin, not for the mission to end. Finished and waiting.

The image wavered. Sasuke looked off into the mist-fueled distance, and suddenly Naruto was overcome with that same aching fear that had tormented him all those years ago. Strip by strip pieces of Sasuke's equipment began to melt away, falling off into the cloud-cover surroundings, taking body parts with it. All color lost. Only that endless milky white of nothing.

Wanted to reach out, and as if knowing that, Sasuke cocked his head to the side and smirked arrogantly. As if to say _there's simply no way, moron_. No matter how hard he tried, pieces of Sasuke were obliterated, flecks of color – the black of his pants, the red lines of his ANBU mask – drifted off, floated away on a current unseen and unfelt until there was nothing.

The smirk faltered, spun down into a tragic little smile that made his heart pump off-beat for a few seconds. Starting and restarting all in the same breath, but enough of a lag to let his body know that something was wrong, that the blood was flowing funny, and it _hurt_.

Blue sky shifted into focus.

"Sasuke. . ."


	6. 15 Bathing in Artificial Light

b Author's Note /b : So, trying to get back into the writing thing, even though classes are currently kicking my ass hardcore as far as demands on my time. I really miss it though. Kinda sucks not being able to plop down whenever I want to write, but such is life sometimes. Anywho, probably could've drawn this out more, but it seemed like a good stopping point since this is a part of my short series. Enjoy!

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He didn't like seeing Naruto here. Entirely unnatural. It had taken Sasuke awhile to figure out why he was so uncomfortable in this place. Wasn't the smell. Wasn't the fact that this was a hospital, that sometimes you walked in but never came out. It was the lighting.

For whatever reason, the brand of artificial that marked these lights made the blond appear worse off than he was. Or so this is what he told himself again and again. Made the blood far too vibrant, a shade of red that breathed and owned and threatened to steal every ounce of color that lived in Naruto's body. He hated that closer-than-death effect the lights had on Naruto's skin.

Because Naruto was sun. A burning, brilliantly bright entity that showed no signs of faltering. The sun didn't just fade. It didn't diminish. It shone on and on, forever offering itself for the better of life. Sasuke had always imagined that this was why Naruto had become hokage. It was, perhaps, the only role that really seemed to fit him.

So when the war came, Sasuke felt a familiar fear creep over him. Not at first, though. He had gone through the first few weeks of battle knowing only self-assurance, the kind that bordered on brashness. Having been through fight after fight [the worst of which had culminated in Itachi's death and left him holding tenaciously onto his own right to live, the Uchiha heir understood his limits and knew the best ways to push them. Just enough to toe the edge without ever greeting the abyss.

It was a different sort of brash from the one Naruto was afflicted with. The blond carried in him the kind of give-all that would've left him more dead than alive if the need called for it. This was what Sasuke began to notice again, the memory of the boy-in-pursuit Naruto had once been all those years ago resurfacing as the fighting got worse. The closer to home, the greater the pressure. Naruto had never really handled pressure smartly.

But luck had always been on his side. Because in a battle, luck counted almost as much as talent sometimes, and when he thought back on it, Sasuke was certain that someone must have been watching out for the boy. Though, there was Kyuubi. . .perhaps that too was luck itself.

Perhaps he was partially to blame for this current situation. Naruto had lost him once. . .

Fingers clenched at his sides, anger crept into the frame. As familiar as the fear that had overcome him. Loss was not something you easily forgot. The easiest base of fear one could build, and fear always led to some rather stupid things.

"Don't ever do that again."

Naruto gave a tight laugh as the last stitch was put in. Despite the pain, he smiled. Like always. It irritated the hell out of Sasuke, and the blond knew it. "Is getting pissed off the only way you know how to show you care?"

"That wasn't a thank you, jackass," Sasuke muttered, turning his gaze to the door as both the well and wounded passed by. Could've been worse. It's what he kept telling himself. Not that it helped him shake the feeling that he was somehow at fault. If Naruto hadn't felt the need. . .

"You're welcome," the blond bit back petulantly. But even that was weak. Sasuke could see in his eyes, the way Naruto's shoulders sagged just slightly, the way the smile hung loosely on his lips, barely there though ready to spring to life at a moment's notice.

With the medical nin now gone, Sasuke let his guard down just slightly. Only for Naruto alone, and even then, the control was just barely relaxed. He didn't need to give the other man any more reason. . .

With a deft flick of his finger, the Uchiha heir turned out the lights, relived to see the shadows crawl over Naruto's face, features highlighted only by the trickle of sunshine through the window. The light made a faint line across the left side of the blond's face, thin and tenuous, as if he could send it scattering into a million pinpricks of gold with a single breath. Naruto sighed.

"Go to sleep, moron." 


	7. 41 Every act of love is separateness

"You've changed."

A rock skipped once, twice, and sunk without fanfare on the third skip. Naruto felt his lips dip with disapproval. He bent down to retrieve another stone, fingers running over its smooth surface with the hazy sense of the familiar. Mind too preoccupied with those almost-there thoughts to give a moment's worth of notice to what was in his hand. His head tilted to the right; a smile was crowned new king on his lips.

"That was bound to happen, Sakura. We all grow up at some point, right?"

Bringing his arm back behind him, Naruto clenched the rock tightly for a moment. Muscles tensed with anticipation. His hand sunk lower, fell past his hip. And then, as if propelled by a vicious self-hate all bite, no bark, he lifted his arm and shot it forward.

"That's not what I meant."

At the last second, his wrist flicked forward as well, fingers releasing the rock. It skidded over the pond's surface, jumping right over the place the last stone had sunk. Naruto could only watch, eyes fixed with a solemn intensity on the water and the rock that dared defy its pull. But even in that. . .it could only go on for so long.

"When he left, I felt like a part of me left too. And I wondered if I'd ever get that back. You know. . .one day, maybe it would return to me." The sunlight flared a bright red along the horizon. The stone hopped its last few paces, catching a few of the sun's rays on its descent. All of it only made the stone seem untouchable, an ember that danced over the black pool of dreams.

Naruto blinked; the stone dropped. All that remained was the aftermath, ripples that betrayed an existence. "But now, I can't help but think that I won't. . .you know, because it was his to take all along."


	8. 43 Eyes meeting over the noise

"Did you really think we should have sent Sakura away?"

Naruto shifted against the rock face, forced an unrestrained smile to his lips that faltered seconds later. The gesture wasn't quite broken to pieces, but there was no denying that the humor sitting there was of the mirthless variety. It was grim acceptance, and the only way Naruto knew how to handle that was by teasing the whole idea of it. Even now, his eyes glinted with a hint of mischief.

Sasuke smirked in response, his gaze fixed on the movements of figures darting through the smoke and dust settling all around them. "Did you really think I'd never come back?"

Poking at the gash on his arm (because it somehow distracted him from all the various others), Naruto offered a quiet bark of laughter. Enough sound to span the slight gap that existed between the two of them, but nothing that could really give away their position. After all, trying to vie for top dog in a screaming contest with a bunch of ear-shattering jutsu tactics was rather idiotic. Even Naruto had to give Sasuke that one.

Actually, he was surprised neither of them had gone deaf over the course of the last hour. Kind of like sitting in the middle of the "new arrivals" ward of the hospital at lunch time. Only amplified a hundred times and then intermixed with the white noise of recess time at Konoha Academy. . .

Naruto missed that actually. He liked kids. Even liked seeing all the babies, conscious-splitting cries and all, as Sakura made her rounds.

The mischief dulled to an almost-not-there flicker of near remorse.

"Moron. . .I'm not carrying your ass all the way home just because you can't stay focused on the situation," Sasuke muttered. An attempt at something like reassurance. He had never really been good at that. Hadn't been at the age of thirteen. Hardly any better now at twenty-five.

With a sigh, Naruto set the back of his head against the stone supporting him from behind. He imagined it was mostly a matter of luck they had stumbled upon the outcropping of rock here, a place to shield themselves from the death-promising flight of shuriken and the strategic but not so selective blasts of exploding tags tacked onto kunai.

Funny. . .for everything he had been brought up to know, for everything battle after battle had taught him, he still harbored the idea that somewhere in the sea of war the word noble had a home.

Sasuke shifted beside him (more below him really), gave a soft grunt that bore more pain than he knew the other man was willing to admit.

"Stop wasting your chakra on those eyes. We don't need them," Naruto admonished, harsher than he had intended but nothing he was willing to apologize for. Pressing a hand behind him, he carefully slid down the rock, wincing as the jagged edges probed wounds and bruising without a hint of remorse. Not that it really mattered. Given enough time, his mind would stop heeding the protests of his body. Or maybe he was already standing at that point. Sometimes it was hard to tell with feeling shuttling in and out of his consciousness, as if on a whim. Some sick game of tag that the body invented to keep you alive, one minute a shock of pain, the next a wash of uncaring numbness.

"Tch. . .My eyes have saved your ass repeatedly today."

"I could've handle myself just fine, jackass." Naruto landed with a soft thud next to his teammate. He'd given up on the nice-and-easy-does-it descent. Stone didn't care what your intentions were, and there was something far more appealing about adding another bruise to his ass than snagging bleeding flesh on some too-sharp corner of limestone.

The look Sasuke tossed his way was lined with exhaustion, but it still had plenty of _Don't fucking kid yourself_ bite. Naruto sighed again, then broke into soft laughter. Warm and unguarded. He was almost certain he could taste the bitter end in those notes.

"How long has it been, Sasuke?"

The Uchiha heir, sole at this point now, looked out of the shadows and once more into the mist of destruction that currently clouded the forest. His fingers twitched, brushed against the side of Naruto's hand. "Too long."

That touch was warm, but in all the wrong ways. Naruto brushed his hand over the fingers that lay beside him, drew wayward lines in the slick coating of red that refused to dry.

"I never thought I'd make it past twenty," Sasuke murmured. He was still looking into the woods, at figures that blurred as they streaked from one position to another. Almost as if none of it was there. . .He snorted, incredulous. "Already fucking twenty-five."

Naruto poked at Sasuke's pinkie. Waiting. "Fucking twenty-five what?"

"You're an idiot."

There was a blast to their left, dirt spraying up and over the overhang to land with little moist thuds all around them. A rock, torn from the side of their shelter, skid to a halt just besides Sasuke's foot. Naruto watched it roll from one side to another before coming to a complete rest. Slow but sure. He almost hated it for that. Didn't even know why really. Just. . .irritated the hell out of him in that moment.

Sasuke sighed, a heavy sound that ended with a strange rattle in his chest. "Tch. . ."

Blue eyes widened, gaze focused on the rock still, the alarm evident. It was the third time that noise had echoed out of his teammate, in his head since they had sent Sakura away. Naruto kept his eyes locked on the wayward stone.

"You're a fucking bastard, you know that, Sasuke?"

The other man snorted in response. A sound that denied nothing about that statement, merely accepted it as truth in the most ridiculing manner possible. "And here I thought you had something intelligent to say. . ."

"Just shut the hell up!"

Naruto shut his eyes, began tapping the back of his head against the wall. Besides him, Sasuke shifted, movements stiff and awkward. Fingers met his again, and instinctively Naruto reached out for them. He wrapped his own around Sasuke's and frowned at the play of heat against ice. What he had to offer wouldn't be enough. . .

Never seemed to be when it came to Sasuke.

With another sigh, the Uchiha heir seemed to settle into some state of relaxed. Naruto finally turned his sights on his teammate. Reaching over, he brushed the dirt that had landed in Sasuke's hair and was more than pleased when eyes met his own. He retracted the offending limb with a smile, weary but still. . .

"What do I tell her, Sasuke?"

There was a smile to greet his own, battle-worn yet tinged with an arrogance that seemed more instinct than learned. When the red began to fade from Sasuke's eyes, Naruto nearly lurched forward. Propelled by a concern that bordered on manic. He was fairly certain he had felt his heart crash into his ribcage before rebounding back into its rightful spot. And still, Sasuke smiled.

"Tell her you kept your promise."


	9. 10 One true thing

And you watch their last breath depart. Telling yourself that it is nothing. _Finally_. Yet, knowing all too well that this will come back to haunt, as surely as every other memory tainted with that face.

It was hard not to think, to dream of him. Not when every bit of him breathed of that man. It wasn't a matter of sleeping with ghosts, but realizing that he was a part of that particular shade, giving it form to function in the living world. Infused with the memories of the dead, things not meant to have been seen or heard, but witnessed nonetheless.

Seeing, for men like himself and his brother, had never been a matter of believing. It was all about having it carved into your mind, second by soul-jarring second. These weren't specters, dreams of the past that shifted like sun over sand. These sorts of memories had souls of their own, emotionally tangible things that stalked the darkness of the mind. It was the fear that gripped you, mid-nightmare; the sinking sadness that drained the breath from your chest. All very much alive.

Knowledge like that was not gained without its trials. A shedding of blood, slick and copper-sweet in electricity-charged air. It was hard to forget those moments. Things he had done himself, willingly (perhaps foolishly), with hands that now trembled ever so faintly at the memory of it all.

A tremor that shook the core of all that he was. The sensation always made him feel like vomiting.

Even if you told yourself the dead were better off left that way, it never meant they stayed as quiet and lifeless as you'd wish them to be. That was the curse of memory, one of man's greatest attributes. As able to live in the moment as they could in the past. Able to see the future with the whispers of yesterday spinning in the sun before it.

It was enough to negate whatever sense of forgiveness he could imagine was waiting for him.

Fingers idly touched to his forehead.

Absolution was not something he had ever hoped for. Though. . .revenge wasn't as empty a thing as Kakashi had lead him to believe. It clung to you, tenacious and undying. The act didn't end with only a hollow sense of guilt to plague your every breath. Rather, it kept on living, now morphed into something much more solid. A promise fulfilled. Like a shadow unnamed but always present, it followed his every thought.

These were the things you didn't forget.


End file.
